Temptations
by yas-m
Summary: It shouldn't have been so easy for Jack to give up his addiction to drugs and alcohol. This is a look at how it would have been for him once they settled in Dharmaville in '77. Jate with a very small dash of Suliet.


**Title:** Temptations  
**Summary:** It shouldn't have been so easy for Jack to give up his addiction to drugs and alcohol. This is a look at how it would have been for him once they settled in Dharmaville in '77. Jate with a very small dash of Suliet.

* * *

Juliet turned back to look at the new recruits, "Ok, take five you guys," she said. It was getting to the end of the shift, the sun starting to set on the other side of the island. She wiped her greasy hands on her blue jumpsuit and walked towards James, who has just finished his chat with Horace, a bright smile shining across her face. "Hi," she said as she reached him, tilting her head to welcome his quick kiss.

"Hi yourself," he said as he pulled back, "how are the new kids?" he asked, gesturing towards her recruits. She looked back, studying the two new additions to the motor pool. There was a lanky eighteen year old who seemed to be allergic to everything her touched or smelled. And there was Kate Austen. "They're ok," she said, "it's just so strange pretending not to know Kate, you know?" She said.

"I know what you mean," James said with a shake of his head, "for the first time in three years I feel I just might slip, ruin our cover because I'm dying to know who won the Super Bowl the last three years, in our century, I mean."

Juliet laughed, "exactly!" she said, "what did Horace want?" she asked.

"Oh," James said, "a security update, with all the new people this week, just wanted to make sure everything's still running smoothly," he paused, causing Juliet to look at him questioningly.

"He also asked about Jack," James explained, "seems Roger came to him complaining that the new workman hasn't shown up for work the last two days."

Juliet cocked an eyebrow in surprise, it wasn't like Jack to neglect his duties, no matter what they were.

"I told him that he'd had a reaction to some of the meds they gave him on the sub on their way here, it's not that uncommon,," James explained.

"But he was never on that sub, so what's up with him?" Juliet asked, a tone of worry in her voice.

"I don't know... Roger had come to me too earlier, and when I went to see him, he did not open his door. He has his curtains closed and all the lights are turned off... Juliet, have you got any clue what he might be up to?" James asked.

She shook her head, "I have no idea. We haven't really talked beyond the formal introductions we had the day they came in... but it's so unlike him," Juliet said.

"I think I know someone who might know something," James said, looking over Juliet's shoulder to spot Kate.

"Kate!" Juliet called to her, "could you come over here please?" Juliet asked, trying to maintain as professional an attitude as possible. It wasn't uncommon for new recruits to get briefings from the Head of Security during their first week, rarely alone, or in the middle of the motor pool, but they were not doing anything too conspicuous to call for any alarm.

Kate made her way the two blonds, watching their careful looks and trying to maintain her cover of not knowing these two people. "Yeah?" she said once she reached them.

"Kate, have you seen Jack the last couple of days?" James asked quickly.

Kate thought back for a moment, she had had breakfast with him the first two days they were back, and even though they had been relatively awkward encounters by their standards, it was still nice to spend some time with him. "Not for a couple of days," she said, trying to play down the smile that had drawn on her lips at the memory of his boyish grin when she opened the door to him that first morning.

James shook her head at him. It wasn't like the Jack and Kate he knew to go a couple of days without seeing each other or talking to each other, even if they had to pretend not to know each other. Kate read the question in his eyes and shrugged, "I didn't think anything of it. Just figured he might have had an earlier shift than I did or something," she quickly explained, not wanting to go into hers and Jack's rocky relationship.

"Kate, he hasn't shown up for work in a couple of days," Juliet said.

"What?" Kate asked.

"He finished his shift of Tuesday, went back to his place, closed the curtains, turned off the lights and didn't come out," James said.

Kate's eyes widened_, what on earth is he up to now?_ she thought to herself. _He probably left, wandered into the jungle in search of whatever brought him back to this Godforsaken place_, she thought, her anger towards him suddenly returning to boil at the surface. "He probably just left, the janitor lifestyle not exactly his," Kate said.

James shook his head, "there has been no activity at the fence, and I've checked the surveillance footage... Kate he hasn't left his house," he said.

"Well, then, he's there. Why are you asking me?" Kate snapped, not exactly sure why the discussion was annoying her but it was.

"Kate... you don't understand," James said, looking at Juliet briefly and reading the same reaction on her face as was on his, confusion as to why Kate was reacting the way she was. Something must have gone terribly wrong between Jack and Kate. "I tried to go see him. He didn't come to the door even after I stood there banging at it for a good ten minutes. I think something's wrong with Jack."

At those words, Kate's entire face dropped, the anger and annoyance she was feeling disappeared and were replaced by worry and concern. A look James recognized quite well. He had seen it their first week on the island when he let it slip to Kate that Jack had gotten himself pinned in a cave in.

Kate swallowed against the lump forming in her throat. She knew what he had been through, and her first thought was that he had relapsed, that coming back had turned out not what he had in mind. She had seen what he was capable of doing to himself, the damage he could inflict on himself and her mind quickly went to the worst of conclusions. Before she knew it, her legs had started running, burning a trail behind her to his house. Images of the man she saw only a week ago at the airport burned in her mind. He had been broken, spiraling out of control, telling her stories where he prayed a plane would crash. She had not been able to help him then and it killed her. She had spent that night crying in her bed, unable to sleep. She would not be able to survive seeing him that way again.

"Kate! Kate!" James called, running after her, "What are you doing?"

"I need to go to him," she said hurriedly.

"Kate, you can't..." James said, "you're not supposed to know him."

"James, please... Jack he's... I need to go to him," she pleaded, "try to come up with whatever cover story for why I'm rushing to a stranger's house, I don't care, but I need to go to him." And with that she was gone before James could argue with her any further.

The run to Jack's house took only a few minutes, and as she stood, catching her breath, she felt a hand land on her shoulder and she gasped.

"Walking through the front door would look slightly less suspicious than climbing through the window," she heard the ever present sarcastic tone in James' voice, even when he was helping.

"Where'd you get this?" she asked, taking the key in her hand, silently grateful he had thought beyond this point because she definitely hadn't given much thought to logistics.

"Head of Security, remember?" he smirked, pointing to his jumpsuit, "do you want me to go in there with you?" he asked gently.

Kate shook her head, "no, it's ok."

* * *

_Three Days Earlier_

_"And you have to be at the infirmary at one. The doctor takes his lunch break then and he doesn't like anyone fussing around when he is in, so that's when you need to get in there. You've got an hour to get the place fixed up before he returns," Roger Linus explained to the new workman. He was taking his role as the new head workman seriously, in his mind, it was his chance to finally be above someone, to have someone to boss around after all those years of being at the bottom of the food chain in this community._

_Jack listened to the man before him bark orders at him, smirking at how the glimmer of power and the faux air of superiority shone in his eyes. Ending up in 1977 and joining the Dharma initiative as a janitor was not how he pictured his returned to the island to go exactly. But then again he did not really know what to expect. So if scraping chewing gum off the bottom of school chairs and scrubbing dirty drawings off of the walls of bathroom stalls was what he was supposed to be doing now then he would do it. He would wait patiently and not try to take control of things, take a chance on this whole destiny thing._

_"Hey! Hey!" he was snapped out of his reverie by Roger waving his hands in front of his face, "are you even listening?" the other man yelled._

_"Infirmary at one. Got it," Jack said, "not exactly nuclear physics," he added under his breath._

_If he was being honest, he was rather enjoying the work, to a certain extent. Being alone, not having anyone running to him with every emergency, just him and his bucket and broom, there was something liberating about it. As long as Roger left him alone. And when he walked into the infirmary that afternoon, surrounded by the familiar smells and colors, he felt a wave of peace pass over him. The sights around him reminded him of his childhood, when he would visit his father at the hospital. The old equipment, the furniture, the posters, they all reminded him of a time when becoming a doctor seemed like an ultimate dream, when it was all he wanted and all he talked about. _

_He walked from room to room, scrubbing floors, dusting, cleaning and occasionally stopping to read a magazine, pamphlet or article. It felt like walking through a museum for medicine and he was honestly enjoying himself. The infirmary wasn't the largest; an office, three exam rooms and a lobby. He finally reached the last room, a small storage room; shelves of gauze, band aids, syringes and a pills. He stopped moving, staring at the shelves in front of him. He felt his legs get heavier, his throat dried and his stomach turned. He had not had anything since Ben flushed his pills down the toilet, and not a drop to drink since the night before. He remembered ordering a drink just before he got a call from his grandfather's nursing home. He remembered going to pour himself a drink before Kate walked into his apartment, before he found her lying on his bed._

_He knew he couldn't stop both, the pills and the alcohol, so abruptly, and each night as he lay on his Dharma bed, staring at the ceiling, his hands shaking, he knew things would only get worse. He walked closer towards the cabinet that held the medicine. He read the labels on the little boxes. Most of them were drugs that had long disappeared off the market in his time. But he was a doctor after all, and he exactly which ones he needed to take to dull his throbbing headaches, to stop his hands shaking and the insomnia._

* * *

Kate walked into the house and was immediately quietly. It was dark, the air heavy with humidity and sweat. She could tell he had not left the house in days, had not opened a curtain or window in that time either. She walked straight towards the bedroom, the layout of his house just like hers. She walked into the dark room and saw his body curled under the covers, a shaking ball. If she didn't know any better she would have thought it was a sick little boy and not the grown man he was. She heard him whimper and went quickly towards his side. His eyes were shut tight, his body quivering and shaking, sweat running down his face. He was sleeping.

She grabbed a chair and placed it next to his bed, sat down and crossed her arms. She was not sure what to do. She did not know what he had done to himself for him to end up like this. Her emotions were bubbling inside of her, threatening to explode. Part of her was angry at him, another part worried to the edge of madness. She wanted him to wake up. She wanted him to wake up to explain himself and she wanted him to wake up to assure her he was fine, that is was just a stomach bug that will pass.

She could get him crackers then.

Jack shifted. He felt another stomach cramp his him and he curled his body tighter, clenching his teeth waiting for it to pass. He knew she was in the room with him now. He had heard her when she unlocked his front door, when she walked into the bedroom and he had felt her breath against his skin when she kneeled beside him. He knew the minute he ignored Sawyer's incessant knocks on his door that he would be sending Kate shortly.

He shut his eyes even tighter, fighting against the tears that hid behind his eyelids. He did not want to open them, could not open. He was too ashamed to face her, too scared of how she would react. He had let her down enough times and did not have the courage or the energy. But soon enough his symptoms got the better of him, and the cramps developed into nausea and his eyes shot open. Wide, blood shot and terrified, he opened his eyes and found himself staring straight at. Before she could react, before she could open her mouth, he was on his feet and rushing towards the bathroom. She got up and ran after him, found his on the ground, throwing up and coughing into the toilet seat. She watched him, hand over her face, tears rolling down her cheeks. She had never seen him like that, so weak, vulnerable. She did not even want to know what he had done.

When he was done, his head falling against the cold ceramic, she went to him, helped him get up on his feet and he did not try to argue with her when she held on to him, helping him back to his bed. She disappeared promptly after he fell onto his bed. He thought that that was it, she had seen enough and wanted nothing to do with him. She had all the right to that too. But she came back, and when she did, a wet, cold towel in her hand, she next on the edge of the bed, gently wiping his forehead and face with it.

She did not say a word and he kept silent as well. She focused on the towel while his eyes traveled to a corner of the room. A few minutes later, she got up, took the towel back to the bathroom and came back. She cracked the bedroom window open and took her place back on the chair across from his bed. She stared at him, waiting for him to say something. But he was as stubborn as she was if not more.

The wind played with the curtains of his room, pushing them to the side, letting the bright moon light to penetrate the dark room. It landed on her face, shining across her freckled cheek, and he could not help recalling the last time that image was displayed before him. The night before the boarded the Ajira flight, she lay beside him, her bare chest rising and falling with her steady breaths and the moonlight danced across her soft skin, teasing him, daring him to trace his fingers across her warm cheeks, her shoulder, down her back. He shook his head, urging the memory to the back of his mind. He met her gaze. Her eyes boring into him, daring him to speak up. A streak of tears cutting through the freckles on her face.

He didn't say a word though, for the longest time he said nothing, just stared back at her. And when she finally spoke, tears gushing down her face, he closed his eyes, letting her words take over,"Jack, I cannot watch you do this to yourself again. I barely survived the first time. And back home I had Aaron, he kept me going. But now, here, I have no one. I have no one except for you. If I lose you, if you lose yourself, I won't be able to live through that."

"I didn't take them," he whispered, his voice barely loud enough for her to hear, his eyes still closed.

"What?" she asked, unsure he had even spoken.

He finally opened his eyes, tried to sit up slightly, "I was cleaning up the infirmary, and I found pills, drugs... similar to the stuff I had been taking before..." he said, his voice choking, tears falling, "I wanted to take them, I wanted to so much, Kate... but I didn't... I couldn't. I ran back here and I... I want to do it right this time."

"Jack? What's happening to you?" she asked, a sob escaping her lips, but she still could not hide the small smile that formed across his lips. He hadn't taken anything, she was relieved.

"Classic withdrawal symptoms," he says, a sarcastic chuckle escaping his throat. That was one thing he never thought he would be diagnosed with, "insomnia, sweating, stomach cramps, anxiety, nausea and vomiting..."

"How long?" she asks, scooting off the chair and sitting on the floor next to his bed.

"I don't know," he shook his head. The pain, the weakness in his eyes, drawn all over his features broke her heart. She knew how hard it was for him to be so out of control of everything, especially when it came to his own mind and body. She knew the shame he might feel to admit that. He refused to admit he needed an appendectomy!

"I'll cover for you," she said, "Sawyer said some new recruits suffer a bad reaction to the stuff they give them on the sub. No one needs to know what is happening."

"Kate, you don't need to do this," he said, hating to drag her into his mess, again.

"Yes, I do," she argued, "I've got your back, remember?"

He could not help but smile at her words, "thank you," he whispered.

His head was getting heavy again, and he fought hard to keep his eyes open. "Go to sleep, Jack," Kate said, still positioned next to his bed.

His eyelids get heavier, and his body slowly falls back down, he turns his head slightly, his gaze catching hers, "thank you…" he whispers_. Stay with me_, he wants to say, but he lacks the courage to do so, "will you be…" he starts but the words fail him.

"I'll be right here when you wake up. I'm not going anywhere," she reassures him.

She watched him sleep, his face contorted in pain, his body curled up and shaking. She reached under the covers and took his hand in hers, wrapping her fingers around it tightly. She believed him. She believed that wanted to get clean, that he wanted to take this second chance to make things right. She remembered how he was when she saw him at the airport the last time. The Jack she saw then scared her. He was supposed to be her rock, the strong one, the one she leaned on. But when she saw him like, broken, devastated and spiraling out of control, she had lost it. She knew she should have been there for him like he would have been for her, to help him out of his downfall, but she couldn't do it.

Sitting next to him now, her hand holding onto his, she made herself a promise, she made him a promise. She would not let him down again. She would not allow him to destroy himself.


End file.
